Pasta consumption is enjoying a rise in popularity for reasons of health, nutrition, convenience and economy. Home consumers and restauranteurs are therefore in need of a pasta product which is prepared in a very short amount of time without loss of palatability or flavor. Commercially available dry pasta takes 9 to 12 minutes to cook for optimal tenderness. Once cooked, the pasta tends to become sticky and to lose a desirable mouthfeel upon standing for any period of time.
Another trend in food products is microwavable foodstuffs, because of the great savings of time and waste for the consumer. It is known in the art to prepare microwave cooked pasta. For example, Golden Grain Macaroni Company markets a product which is cookable in warm water. Its package directions require placing pasta in warm water; microwaving to boiling; continued boiling for three minutes to absorb water; and flavoring with a cheese sauce. However, the boiled pasta suffers great starch loss and is only palatable when sauce is added to the boiled product to mask its gumminess and starchiness.
It is also known in the art to prepare an uncooked pasta product which is tolerant of an initial exposure to room temperature or colder water. This allows the pasta to be microwave cooked by adding non-boiling water, inasmuch as the pasta product is pretreated in such a way as to stabilize it against starch leaching when exposed to cold water. Specifically, such pasta, which is the subject of a U.S. patent application Ser. No. 225,211, of Chawan et al., filed July 28, 1988, and assigned to the assignee of the present invention, experiences a starch loss, after cooking, of less than about 7.0% by weight of the uncooked pasta.
That application teaches that one way by which such cold water tolerant pasta may be prepared is to subject it, after shaping, to a high temperature treatment, i.e., at least about 180.degree. F. (about 82.degree. C.). Such treatment may be accomplished in any of a number of ways, including treatment in a dryer (e.g., a hot air, humidity controlled circulating oven), microwave oven, heated drum, infrared tunnel, dielectric heater, or by contact with superheated steam. Preferably, however, the high temperature treatment is performed using a tres haute temperature (THT) drier, such as the one disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,699,048 to Pavan.
While such treated pasta has the desirable property of microwave cookability due to its cold water tolerance, its processing is undesirable in that it requires additional and expensive equipment, i.e., a drier capable of tres haute temperature drying. Such dryers may cost as much as one million to three million dollars.
It is also known, as in Katz et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,138,462, to heat an entire pasta extruder to temperatures as high as 140.degree. C. (about 284.degree. F.). However, that patent is concerned with the extrusion of already cooked or gelatinized pasta, the heating probably being performed in order to avoid clogging of the die. Furthermore, this patent does not address the issues of cold water tolerance and microwave cookability.
It is further known in a pasta extrusion process, as in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 39,744 to Ventres et al., filed Apr. 20, 1987, assigned to the assignee of the present invention, to heat the die head, or throat portion, of an extrusion die, upstream of the die plate to a temperature which approximates the temperature of the alimentary paste within the extruder. However, inasmuch as the heating takes place upstream of the paste-shaping die orifices, no effect is experienced by the already formed pasta shapes.